I was totally enraptured of the scene, unable to even reflect on how my own feelings were. The morning was so mild, so very mild and clear, perhaps the most mild and most clear of the entire summer. There too was the strange purity of air, almost an emanation from the pure loch water. If this scene could have reminded me of anything it could only have been of the Horsemen of Harris as witnessed by Martin Martin more than two hundred years ago. And yet, perhaps I speak only of the day itself, the actual atmosphere, the light and aural texture, for what could ever be likened to the figures I was now seeing? I was an intruder, and beholding a vision so awful that at once I myself had been transformed into victim. I could see them distinctly, the troop of almost thirty, the red circles of their faces, the unquiet, seeming to contain a frenzy. And a figure had moved too quickly and bumped into the figure in front and the laughter of the pair was immediate, and nervous too, scarcely controlled at all, revealing the anticipation of an event so horrible that hackles arose on the back of my neck, the hairs rising, on the back of my neck; and a shiver crossed my shoulders, I was having to fight hard to resist it, this terror.
